Disclosure: Meeple Mountain received a free copy of this product in exchange for an honest, unbiased review. This review is not intended to be an endorsement.
Volterra is an abstract from Steffen Spiel, one of my favorite small box game publishers. In keeping with their other games, this box contains polished wood pieces that form a game with simple rules and an interesting twist. Let’s get it to the table so I can show you what I mean.
Playing Volterra
Take the 20 wooden tiles (10 light and 10 dark) and create a 4×5 checkerboard. You’ll each place your pawn on the tile in the middle of the board that matches your color.
And that’s all there is to the setup.
In Volterra, all tiles are referred to as Towers. This is true of a stack of tiles or individual tiles.
On a turn, you’ll take two actions in whichever order you choose:
- Move your pawn to an adjacent Tower, orthogonally or diagonally, of your color
- Choose a Tower of your color that is both next to your pawn and has at least one edge exposed. Move its topmost Tower, or topmost two Towers, atop another Tower that is orthogonally or diagonally adjacent to it. (This can cover either of your Towers or your opponent’s Tower)
By choosing the order you take your actions, you’re able to better balance the offensive/defensive nature of your moves. You can, for instance, choose to make an adjacent Tower taller and then move your pawn onto it. Or, perhaps you’d like to or move to a Tower your opponent might want to use first—Towers with pawns on them cannot be moved—then build up another Tower out of their reach.
End game
Play continues until one player cannot complete both actions. Whoever has the tallest Tower wins, with ties being decided by the next highest Tower.
Thoughts
Volterra is a tricky little game. The small size of the board and the two actions per turn will mean games are short. As one would imagine, the board will appear to fold into itself quickly, limiting your choices—and making you think harder than you expected.
My initial plays of Volterra were spent discovering the intricacies of the simple rules within the context of real games. Many times you can get a feel for a game’s strategies during the teach. Volterra is not one of them. Sure, you have an idea of the first moves. However, as with ZÈRTZ, the reality of the changes needs to be experienced to be understood.
And yet, after a few games, I was starting to feel like I’d seen most of what Volterra had to offer. With a limited number of tiles, and an even more limited series of first moves, I thought the game might get old quickly.
While I still harbor those reservations, I’ve also experimented with the alternate setup option given in the rulebook. This rule drops the rigid checkerboard pattern for a random build-as-you-go pattern. It may produce visually chaotic results, it also produces some interesting game boards to work with.
Like most Steffen Spiele games I’ve played, Volterra is a good, quick abstract that would make a good two-person game night opener. It would also make a great vacation game and/or a game for a parent and child to play while discussing board game strategies.
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